Environments of Opportunity

Lukas: Where did you like to play as a child? I ask this question a lot because childhood memories shape us into the people we become. Welcome to Play It Forward, a Wearthy podcast. I'm your host, Lukas Ritson. Thanks so much for joining me.

I talk a lot about play. I'm a dad, I'm a husband, I'm an educator, and I'm a playground designer. So I want to gather some of my favorite people who are advocates of children and nature and create a space to have an honest conversation about getting more kids outside. The power of play is very often underestimated, and I think we all need a little more play in our lives.

At Wearthy, we're in what feels like our first steps down the never-ending trail of impacting early childhood development. So this week we are welcoming a couple of game changers, a couple of play makers if you will, all the way from the United States, who have come together to make a huge impact in connecting more children and their communities with nature.

One of our next guests is the President and CEO of the Children and Nature Network, that you've heard me speak so much about. She is an award-winning nature lover with decades of experience building relationships and establishing vision for improving equitable access to nature for people of all backgrounds and abilities. A big warm welcome to Sarah Milligan-Toffler. Thank you so much for joining us, Sarah.

Sarah: Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here.

Lukas: Our second guest today is a Senior Executive of the National League of Cities Institute of Youth Education and Families. Originally pursuing a musical career and becoming a conductor for the Mississippi Symphony Orchestra, he is now conducting strategies for cities, towns, villages, children, youth and families to thrive. Another warm welcome to Dr. Robert Blaine.

Robert: It is a pleasure to be with you, Lukas.

Lukas: And we've got to split up today. We've got Atlanta for Sarah and we've got DC for Dr. Blaine. So the world's combined. So as we start with all guests, what's up with you, Sarah? Where did you play as a child?

Sarah: That's a great question. I grew up outside of, just north of Dayton, Ohio in a small town there where, you know, I walked to school, I rode my bike to school. We didn't have computer games and things like that yet. I'm aging myself, but you know, there was the creek and there was the woods and we were kind of kicked out of the house until the street lights came on with love. And you know, I will say that in many regards, it was kind of the dead end of a cul-de-sac. I mean, it wasn't special nature, but our imaginations went wild out there and we built houses and bicycle jumps and all kinds of things that my mother probably would not be happy to know, wouldn't have been happy that I was out there doing that. But we figured stuff out and we had a lot of fun. So that was my place as a kid.

Lukas: And it's no surprise you find yourself in the field you do now then.

Sarah: That's right.

Lukas: And same question to you, Robert. Where did you play as a child?

Robert: Well, it's funny. I've learned a lot about Sarah that I didn't know, and we grew up very similarly. I grew up in suburbia just outside of Washington DC. And all of my friends and I, we had of course games in the streets. The street was our playground. We played football and basketball and tennis and anything that you could play with a ball in the street we did. But I lived one block from a community park, and we had a really large park and all the things that we could do there with baseball diamonds and playing in the woods and creeks. And in the wintertime it would snow and we'd go sledding. Really wonderful opportunity to be able to engage with nature just outside of a major city.

Lukas: So once again you see those worlds collide, transitioning through impacting. And there's no surprise you've teamed up with the Children & Nature Network to create more of that in cities. For many of our listeners, they wouldn't be familiar with the National League of Cities or specifically within the Institute for Youth and Education. Can you just give a breakdown for our listeners what you're doing?

Robert: Yeah, the National League of Cities, we are actually the voice of cities, towns, villages across the United States. We have more than 2,400 member cities across the US. And the mission of our organization is to strengthen local leadership, influence US federal policy, and drive innovative solutions. Now within the National League of Cities, I lead an institute called the Institute for Youth Education and Families. And essentially our institute is about opportunity. We center values on racial equity, economic and power, high quality education, equal justice, and strong health outcomes irrespective of zip code. It doesn't matter where you live. We believe that all people deserve opportunity. And we do that through essentially five verticals that we have within the institute: early childhood success, education and expanded learning, promoting a culture of health, youth and young adult connections, and economic opportunity and financial empowerment.

Lukas: Wow, I wish we had that. And there's never been a more important time than right now with everything we've been facing with the pandemic. And as we're all aware, it's the communities that are not already supported that are the most impacted. They're the first ones to be affected by job cuts, they're the first ones to be affected by school closures. So have you seen a change in urgency around impacting this? Has it created that shift? Has it brought that spotlight and shined it on this and has it done anything?

Robert: Absolutely. You know, the conversation that we have been saying is that the pandemic has changed the conversation from nice to necessary. For a long time we've advocated for many of these initiatives. And in our conversation with local governments and with the federal government, there's always been a conversation where people say, "Well, that's really nice if we could do those things." But now there's a realization that it's not just nice but it's absolutely necessary. That we live in a connected world and that we need to be able to give our children opportunities to engage, to learn, to play, to be engaged with nature. All of that is absolutely necessary now. And in the space of a pandemic, being able to have outdoor spaces that are safe where children can engage is incredibly important. So you're exactly right that that shift in the conversation is happening right now. And with partners like Sarah, we're really excited about leveraging this work to the advantage of all communities across our country.

Lukas: I like that. "Nice to necessary" — taken. It's highlighted on my page right here. And to flip over to Sarah, and combining with that relationship with the National League of Cities Youth Education Families, what's the role of the Children & Nature Network within this relationship and collaboration?

Sarah: Yeah, well thank you. And you know, I will start by saying that it's an incredible privilege to have the opportunity to partner with an organization like the National League of Cities. And that relationship started about seven years ago. And I'll talk a little bit more about that. But first I'll just say, the role of the Children & Nature Network is to really advocate for what Robert just talked about: that all children have a right to the benefits of a healthy natural world and be connected to that everywhere they live, learn, and play.

And you know, as was alluded to here, we know that too often a child's zip code, their race, their gender, their ability level impacts whether or not they have regular access to the outdoors. And we saw that with the pandemic. I mean, it just became glaringly obvious where those gaps were, and so many other glaring gaps as well. But for sure this is access to the outdoors. And when many people were looking for solace in the outdoors, it became obvious that not every community had that access.

So that really, I mean, our mission has always been to increase equitable access to nature because we recognize that to get to that vision of all children, we really have to start with those kids that have the least access and really understand what those barriers look like in every community. Which in some cases, it's kind of the same, but it always plays out a little differently in every community. So it's really important to think about what does equitable access look like locally in a community.

And so that's, you know, we work with Robert and his team and others to really build the capacity of local leaders and communities to create that equitable access. So just moving into this partnership, seven years ago we launched an initiative called Cities Connecting Children to Nature. And it was really kind of this almost a theory, like if we engaged local leaders, municipal leaders, in thinking about the natural infrastructure that exists in their communities as a way to ensure that every child in the community has that access, could we get further faster? Could we get deeper in these strategies in partnership?

And I will just say, in a hundred years the Children & Nature Network could never develop a network like Robert and the National League of Cities has. To be able to have access to 2,400 municipal leaders across this country to get this message out — that has been incredible. And then I think, I hope, that the Children & Nature Network has been able to bring some expertise, some technical knowledge, solutions that are proven, the research, all of those pieces to help inform municipal leaders in making better, hopefully more holistic and integrated decisions.

So that as we recognize that nature is one piece that needs to be around children to help them thrive, they do need access to economic opportunity, to good education, to all of those kinds of things. But nature is part of that puzzle. So I'll just say we're seeing really creative solutions. Robert and I will talk more about this, but park-library partnerships, greening of school grounds, greening early childcare centers. And as you mentioned earlier, we are really seeing this urgency around outdoor learning.

And it's a big moment for that because I think, you know, in the United States, people may have heard about the American Rescue Act and federal stimulus dollars coming in. A lot of those dollars are being directed towards ventilation in schools. Which, you know, certainly some schools maybe do need some new HVAC systems. But they can also use those dollars to put in outdoor classrooms, windows, doors — that's ventilation too. So just huge opportunities right now in terms of working with local governments to really think about not how do we get back to normal, but how do we get back to better.

Lukas: And speaking to Richard Louv, we're prompted to act before we forget normal. And that's really sat on my heart a lot. And the urgency for these children that are being affected, for the advocates to step in and not do the learning for them, not do the growing for them, just offer the infrastructure for them to grow.

One of the things that intrigues me — and I love to look to the Children & Nature Network because it gives us this sneak peek into the future, being in Australia — and the work you were doing is like in front of us as I see it. So when it comes to that messaging and how you teamed up to deliver this messaging to highlight nature as an integral part, and to give that a bit of context, in Australia it's very segmented between the cities and suburbs and schools. They're all their individual thing.

So how did you get the shift to move away from that academic focus, the infrastructure focus? Also going into these cities and talking to mayors about, "Hey, we actually need to prioritize nature," and you're having an impact with this. And they have shifted, and a number of cities have adopted the Children's Bill of Rights or the Right to Play charters and things like that, which are phenomenal. So what was the messaging you took to them for them to see it as important? I'll ask that — you can both answer that, by the way.

Robert: I'll jump in first and then I'll let Sarah give the details. One of the things that we look at, I should say that part of my background is as an academic. I ran universities for part of my career. And one of the things that we always talked about in the university environment is what we call active learning — how do you learn by actually doing. And being able to build environments for active learning for children happens through play. It happens through engaging in your natural environment.

And so the lessons from cognitive science have taught us that in order for children to learn most authentically, we need to have environments that actually support that. And I think that many municipalities are understanding this now. Cities like Rochester, New York have their Right to Play charters in their cities. And the fact that these municipalities are really thinking about how children engage in an environment that's supportive of their learning, I think, is just so incredibly important.

And Sarah and her team really have put the meat on the bones for these municipalities and shown them how they can use many different strategies to be able to use outdoor learning and play as a way of supporting the academic environment, as a way of strengthening what happens in the classroom. And I think it's just a perfect duality. It brings together the way that children learn authentically, and I think that it's a really strong support for the academic environment.

Sarah: And I will build off of that and I think maybe even take one step to the back in terms of our partnership, because I think it's really important to understand that in the United States, and the way the National League of Cities has built up its reputation over many, many years, I mean, municipalities look to them for guidance on what really makes a resilient, healthy, vibrant community.

And so we had all the messaging, but it mattered who the messenger was. I mean, the Children & Nature Network can stand out here all day long and say, "Hey, connecting your kids to nature is good for them." Like, what do they expect us to say? Give us a break. The National League of Cities is an authority on what makes a good city, period, irrespective of kind of the specific strategy, right?

And so for them to step forward and say, "You know what, there's this thing that we've kind of missed." I mean, many of us — I have not met one leader in my entire life that's of kind of my generation-ish, ten plus, ten minus, that the outdoors in some way, shape, or form wasn't part of their formation as a child and a really critical part of forming those social bonds, learning leadership skills informally, finding their love of learning — all those kinds of things.

So I think for the Children & Nature Network, there was a really specific strategy in place here to see if we could partner up with somebody who wasn't a nature organization. It was just about effective communities and start to weave nature connection into that narrative. And I think we're still in that process, but I would say that I think that it has been effective in terms of getting that message out there in a way where adoption is starting to happen in a relatively speaking short period of time.

Lukas: Yeah, and just to highlight to our listeners, it's a non-government organization, the National League of Cities, as well.

Robert: Yes. Wow.

Lukas: And so obviously you've started to implement these things. People are acting on it because the evidence is there. People implementing their childhood charters and rights to play, changing policy. There has been some great announcements within the Vice President now Harris announcing the use of the National League of Cities to implement that of the rescue plan as well. So what are some examples of changes you've seen in cities with the assistance of both the Children & Nature Network and the National League of Cities?

Robert: Well, I'll just give a couple right off the top. When we look at Children's Outdoor Bills of Rights, there's been cities like San Francisco, California; Austin, Texas; Baltimore, Maryland; Salt Lake City, Utah; the city that I was talking about earlier, Rochester, New York. They not only developed the Children's Bill of Rights, but it was also adopted by the city council and they've announced plans for an urban nature center. So there are some cities that are really taking a leadership role and really thinking about how they really engage this and integrate it with a city development strategy.

Lukas: That's so interesting because from a geek play level, it was the institutionalization of public play spaces came from New York. It was like, all right, let's get the swing, the seesaw, the sand pit, the slide, put that in there. There's play, we're done. Take out everything else. But now you're getting New York that's going back completely the other way and leading. It's really exciting.

Robert: And you know, it's an opportunity to actually provide some models there for other cities. And I think that we have some great exemplars that are taking real leadership roles. And what's exciting about it is that as we build momentum, Sarah and her group, they have a methodology in working with cities that allows for a city to not just replicate the work, but to do the work in a way that has a sense of place. And it's so important that when you're working with these municipalities, that it's informed by where they are and who they are and what their background is, and that these spaces engage in a learning experience that teaches children about where they are and who they are.

Lukas: Yeah, and like it sounds to me, it's like not rolling out that cookie cutter solution and honoring those communities to take charge.

Robert: That's exactly right.

Lukas: So Sarah, what are some of those strategies you use to honor these individual cities and essentially hand the importance over to them?

Sarah: I mean, I think that in partnership with the National League of Cities team, we've really developed a process where we work with city leaders to say, "Okay, what does equitable access to nature look like in your community?" Or another way of asking that is, "Who doesn't have access?" And start to look at that and say, "Okay, well what are those barriers? And let's go talk to those communities and ask them about that."

We've yet to find community members who say that they don't want a park for their children, that they don't want gardens where they can grow fresh food, that they don't want these things. They do. They want them. And it's just a matter of people being able to articulate in their particular community what does that look like, what kinds of amenities might they like in those spaces.

And really, I think it's the combination of that grassroots — I mean, we fully believe that residents know their own communities best. And they have ideas and solutions. And sometimes they need support in framing that and being able to share that with their municipal leaders and to bring that partnership together. And I feel like we really need both a grassroots and a grasstops coming together to really make good decisions and to ensure that when a strategy is implemented, there have to be resources that support that, there have to be policies that support that. And grassroots leaders can't do that by themselves. That's what governments are for, working to create a bigger vision and ensure that there are the resources around that to ensure that the solutions are durable and not just kind of a flash in the pan.

And so that's really, you know, kind of a long way of describing a process. But we ask questions and guide municipal leaders and their local partners through a design process, really. And then they come up with the solutions. We certainly do provide examples for them. A big part of what we do is these cities work in cohorts and there's a lot of peer learning and sharing.

And they can call each other. "Hey, you know, the Mayor of Houston, I know you all are using flood recovery dollars to get green schoolyards in. How did you do that?" During COVID, we had a whole Google sheet, I think is what it was — it wasn't anything terribly sophisticated — but people were sharing ideas about how they were handling park openings and closures and how they were communicating about that. And there was information sharing back and forth. And providing that opportunity for folks to learn from each other is huge. And for folks to not feel like they're alone. They're part of a true network, they're part of a learning community.

So those have been some of the strategies that we've used that are very effective. I will also say we do pass through dollars to cities. So the way I like to think about it is that there's private investment for three to five years, somewhere in there is probably the sweet spot, where then cities themselves are able to start changing resource flows and taking on that expense themselves and building into capital budgets and building into their own planning, putting staff members on their own payrolls, leveraging local dollars for implementation. But that influx of money so that there are people sitting at that city whose job it is to think about this — that matters. And to think that people are going to do it out of the goodness of their heart, they might want to, but if their paycheck is paying them to do something else, that's what they're going to do.

Lukas: Yeah, exactly. And a theme I hear time and time again through our brief chat so far is that there's the theme of top-down and bottom-up continuously. It's not like the one-stop shop and like, "This is how you do it." And it's not a matter of fixing, it's not going into community and saying, "Hey, you're broken." It's saying, "You matter." And that's where the big shift comes. I think you do it so brilliantly and respectfully.

And that might lead into Robert — there's with the opportunity of economics that plays into opportunity zones that you've worked on as well. So if you — I just find it very interesting, we don't have opportunity zoning in Australia — could you just give a brief summary of that? Because when I heard it, I was like, oh, I got to find out about this.

Robert: Sure. Yeah. Opportunity zones are actually a federal program where essentially we have what we call census tracts. These are small subsections of a city or a municipality. And the program is organized around what they call qualified census tracts — in other words, a census tract that is showing need. Often these are communities that have been under-invested or historically disinvested. And what opportunity zones do is actually bring a framework for reinvestment in some of these communities, both bringing together federal dollars and private dollars into some of that work. And so it is a strategy that can be leveraged, especially when we're having these conversations about equity and how do we focus on parts of our communities that have not received the fiscal investment needed in order to really provide for all of their citizens.

Lukas: Yeah. And you're not assessing economic value all the time though. I'm probably going to massacre this. I can't see it in my notes, but is it a dignity index? A dignity economy?

Robert: Economy. That's right. Yeah.

So you know, prior to this role with the National League of Cities, I was the Chief Administrative Officer for the City of Jackson, Mississippi. And essentially the CAO sits next to the mayor and he's the person that the mayor tells what to do. He's the person that actually has to run the city and make sure that the trains run on time.

And as the mayor, Mayor Chokwe Lumumba, as he was taking office, we sat down and we started to talk about models, economic models that we've seen in cities across the US and across the world, really. And what we said is that you can look in many cities and find what we called economic models of humiliation. So when you see blight and crime and lack of opportunity, poor educational outcomes, etc., essentially you're looking at economic models that are focused on the humiliation of communities.

And what we said was that we wanted to essentially flip that on its head and create an economic model where we were investing in the inherent dignity of every citizen in the city. And so what that meant for us was that we had to be really intentional about exactly what Sarah's talking about: How do we sit down and map out where inequities are in our community? How do we use that as data to think about how we flow investments into communities that have just not historically had it? And how do we use this as an environment to make sure that we are supporting families in a way that actually supports their growth?

It's so important for children to have an environment where, when we talk about equity, it's not about making sure that everybody has the same thing, but it's making sure that children have the necessary opportunity that they need in order to be able to have a level of access that's common. And so that means that you might have to do more in one community than you do in the next. But it's about trying to bring everybody to the same starting line together.

Lukas: And it seems like you've got the theory in the background. And why this relationship between you both is so impactful is, in my observation, I see so much theory and great intention and policy. But when it comes into hitting the ground and actually implementing it and handing it over to community, that's a shortfall. So I think a tangible representation of this is the fact that you have the Outdoor Bill of Rights as something you've implemented collectively.

And we, as a mission — I'm a part of the Australian Institute of Play — and one of our missions is to try to get this Bill of Rights in and petition government to implement that. So what's your tips? What's your advice and wisdom around implementing these Bill of Rights and how did you go about it?

Robert: Well, I think I'll start and then I'll let Sarah jump in. This piece around engaging the community I think is incredibly important. And when Sarah talks about the grassroots and the grasstops, we used to talk about "astroturf," which is artificial grass, right? But essentially it's grassroots but it's very organized and it has a way of being able to get all of those authentic voices into the conversation, but do it in a way that is actually supportive of the municipality and in a way that municipal leaders can authentically engage in the same conversation.

So many times we have conversations where we're talking past each other. And it's really important when you have someone like the Children & Nature Network to be able to structure the conversation in such a way that people are actually talking to each other about solutions and how those solutions can actually benefit all of the community.

Sarah: Thanks, Robert. That's really well put. And one of the things that I'll say about the Children's Outdoor Bill of Rights, or COBARs is what we call it for shorthand, but I have to say I wasn't a huge fan of them at first because I was thinking, you know, okay, so a mayor can go in there and have a photo op and point to a thing and check that box and move on and not do anything. And I think that there is a danger with that.

But I think what we have been seeing with these efforts, particularly at the local level, is that if the COBARs are being used in galvanizing residents and partners to come together to bring about the programs, policies, fundings, activities needed to ensure equity and access to nature, it can be used as a platform. But you want to make sure that it's being used as an organizing tool and not an end in and of itself, if that makes sense.

And then I thought it might be helpful for me to share — our teams, and truly it's the folks on Robert's team and the folks on my team that work together, I mean, they really are working together hand in glove every day on these issues — so they have come up with kind of a list of lessons learned from COBARs from around the country that I thought might be helpful to share with your listeners.

The first thing that they suggested is including more co-signers for greater impact. So a city government-led COBAR can be more impactful if they include school districts and county health departments, federal land agencies, and grassroots partners. So like to think broader about, again, kind of to that theme I was talking about, galvanizing interest. And the same would be true if it's a grassroots-led thing — they should be looking to get their city government involved. Just thinking about who are all the interested parties in this and get them to sign on.

Using the COBAR as a media opportunity to tie in other related goals and activities in the city. Baltimore, Maryland, Mayor Young there signed Baltimore's COBAR at an event that was celebrating Baltimore Wildlife Week, and it served as a media opportunity while accomplishing another city goal.

A third recommendation or thing that we've seen that's been successful is creating a one-two punch by launching COBAR with another nature connection project. So for example, in Austin, Texas, the COBAR was a collaboration between various city agencies, the local school district, and it was launched alongside a green schoolyards project to prove that the partners were serious about making connections to nature a reality. So it was like, here's this bill of rights, but here is an example of what we're actually doing to make it a reality.

Connecting COBAR rights with existing children's programming and in partnerships with agencies that have trusted relationships with children and families — really important. Salt Lake City engaged a trusted city agency that already had connections with local kids and their families, and it allowed the city to create a tangible program with funding attached.

And then the last thing is really this question of equity. So, for example, San Francisco and Austin use their equity zone mapping to determine where children are lacking access to their outdoor rights and need further resources and programs in order for those rights to be fulfilled.

So those are just some examples that we have seen and just tips that we would offer for folks, and hopefully in Australia, to pick this up and make these kinds of things happen as well.

Lukas: A hundred percent. There's things in there that I can instantly imagine implementing and taking action on. So personally, in addition to our listeners, thank you for those action points.

What I'm hearing there is that you've really managed to move beyond the token, the handshake, the donation. I was talking to a client of a therapy center recently, and they called us in. They've got this beautiful nature zone. And then they were having a sponsor, sponsor money, to renovate the zone to offer some more therapy for children. And I was like, this is brilliant, look at all this nature! And they said, no, we can't, we're not going to do that because the sponsor wants to have a cubby with something they can put a plaque on. And initially they wanted to give toys so they could shake hands and get some photos.

That's a type of thing you've seemed to move past. I know it's probably obvious and it states it in the name, but you've got the bill — it's a Bill of Rights. But when you're approaching these communities, are you saying this is a right? Or is it an act of well-being? Or are you solving an equity challenge? Like, what angle do you approach these councils with?

Robert: I think it's all of the above. I mean, it checks all of those boxes. And I think that when you're having a conversation with the municipality, there is a context that these conversations are always a part of. And I think there is — you gave three great front doors that we can go into that conversation with. I think there might be a couple other side doors that we can use to enter into that conversation.

But there are side doors around, when we think of, for example, how a city might think of economic development. Or if they're thinking of — some municipal leaders are very much focused on the economics of their city and they want to be able to show something, that bringing a new company into town, that's going to be a highlight for them, right? They might not necessarily be thinking directly of the children or equity or some of these other concerns. But it's a side door for us to get into that conversation, right? And we come in through that way, because we've got to be able to start the conversation first, but then the goal is that we're driving them towards the outcomes that we want to be able to see.

Lukas: The loving Trojan horse.

Robert: Exactly.

Sarah: I would say education is another one. And it was interesting, Lukas, you made an inference that I'd like to just check out — the idea of moving to green schoolyards and outdoor learning is somehow a move away from academics. What our research, the research that we look at, shows is that children who have access to regular outdoor learning actually have higher graduation rates, better attendance, better engagement in school.

So it's not a turn away from academics, but a way that — particularly, the research is very strong in showing that the benefits of outdoor learning are proportionally greater for those students with other barriers to graduation. And I don't know, it's interesting, Robert. Something that you said earlier makes me wonder if there's a connection to this.

Because I think about, if you picture in your mind a school that is surrounded with blacktop and cars and maybe there's a rusty old basketball hoop out there and some four square lines — and that was my school — you kind of share the playground with the cars and whatnot. Versus a school where there are beautiful places to play and maybe gardens and other things. How does that child feel about their community's investment in them?

Robert: Yeah. And I do think that those spaces, where the physical environment is attended to as supportive of the growth and development and learning of children, it is connected to that sense of a child's feeling of worth. And I think that that's something that we just kind of think of the playground as like a maintenance problem.

Sarah: Yeah, yeah.

Robert: As opposed to something that supports the healthy development of our children.

Lukas: Yeah. And we see that all the time. A friend of mine, Steve Kanowski, at the start of COVID, he implemented nature play and loose parts play. And it's a — I think it's about 60 percent of the school are in the category of at-risk, highest at-risk children. And he actually kept his school open during lockdown because it was better for the children to be there than not.

He's seen crazy impacts, like he had a 70 percent drop in violent incidents in one year. Twenty-five percent of those children were getting straight A's within one year. Sixty percent — yep. And it's time and time again, because they've got this functional — and it can't be taken away as punishment. And it's saying, no, you matter. This is yours. This is your ownership. And that's trickled onto the community.

So when you're implementing in your grassroots — that kind of like the "you matter" action — is these green yards. So what effect do you observe within the wider community, moving beyond the school, that these green playgrounds have had?

Robert: I think that when you add community into the work, and as Sarah was saying, community is a part of the development process, the voice of the community is a part of this process. There's a kind of ownership that happens where community members are not renters of their communities. They are true owners.

And many times you'll find — I know in Jackson, there were all kinds of community events that would happen in playgrounds, in parks, in these spaces, because there was a greater sense of ownership of what that was. And when we talk about connections to other maladies in community, like crime and some of these other things, there was an actual engagement in the community to ensure that these places were safe zones for children. And they wouldn't allow any of those negative forces to come into that space.

And so that kind of ownership that comes with engaging people and actually hearing their voice and allowing their voice to be resonant and to manifest itself into a place that is supportive of children — I think it's just the way that you build authentic communities that people really care about.

Sarah: I couldn't agree more, Robert. And I would just add to that, that oftentimes people will say, "Well, geez, if we open up this playground, it won't be safe for children," right? But when you go through the process — and we've seen this over and over again — of this authentic community engagement, and people, as you say, like they see their ideas, like, "Wow, there's that garden that I wanted!" or "There's that new soccer field!" or whatever it is. People see that they're being listened to. They actually have eyeballs on that space.

And what they actually find is that crime goes down, even though the school officials every time will say, "We're afraid if we take that chain link fence and the barbed wire off that the bad element's going to come in." It's like, no, it's that barbed wire that sends a signal that this is some kind of shady place. If there's children and families and dogs and folks in these spaces, folks aren't going to be doing bad stuff.

And we also really see, the community outcomes, the learning outcomes we talked about. We see health and wellness outcomes from beneficial play, from increased physical activity. One of the big things that the research shows us is reduced stress, that children's stress level goes down and their overall mental health improves.

And then the thing we haven't talked much about — our environmental outcomes. And if you're putting green infrastructure in these spaces, we know that at least in the United States — I don't know if this is true in Australia — the public schools are one of the top three landholders in most communities. If you're putting green infrastructure, I mean, that can be game-changing in terms of water management in our communities. And then what you plant there, if there's native plantings and trees, it supports wildlife habitat, urban heat island. And then because that's our schools, that's where the children go, we're improving environmental literacy.

So it's kind of this multi-solving, like this space that we think of as a school ground has so many intersections with learning outcomes, health and wellness, community, and environment. So it's one that we're excited about. We really hope it will be taken up at scale.

Lukas: A hundred percent. And what I love about it, it sees tangible representations to the programs that you're all — the hard work you're doing behind the scenes that these communities won't necessarily see. And then you can come and go, "Here's a deliverable that's yours."

And I'm assuming that's a really proactive way to overcome the stigma within communities. I know in Australia we have the stigma around certain suburbs and areas. Is the biggest determinant of education and children's outdoor play is stigma. So do you see that in your actions? And how do you overcome that stigma? If there's any other ways, the perception — so if you've got an area like a downtown area that's generally known, the association of that stigma is where homeless people are, where there's high theft, there's crime. So the stigma around the negative connotation, more so to suburbs. And is there any other strategies that you implement to overcome that?

Sarah: I mean, Robert, I'd be interested in hearing what you have to say. But I think it's going to sound a little bit like a broken record here, in that it really is all about engaging with that local community that lives in those spaces. Listening to them. Treating them with dignity and respect. Creating shared visions for what these outdoor spaces can be. And sometimes it's just talking through what those concerns are and collectively brainstorming around how we can mitigate the concerns that folks might have.

And people really — I'm always just amazed — when people are given a voice, a platform, a place to envision, particularly a better life for their children, it's amazing what they'll come up with. And ideas that aren't necessarily that hard to implement. And it's important to bring various stakeholders together in that conversation.

And there's an education process that goes along with it. I think in examples — it always helps to show, well, okay, meet these people here that did it in Chicago, or these people here that did it in Rochester, New York, or Houston, Texas. It helps to have examples and real people that have gone through the process and made it work.

Robert: And Lukas, just to add on to what Sarah was saying, when you talk about that stigma, it sounds very much like what the mayor and I were articulating around this model of humiliation, right? And really kind of thinking that there are some areas that almost don't deserve investment, right? And how do we rethink that in a way that we say that every part of our community deserves investment. And children deserve opportunity.

And opportunity happens when you have an environment that actually supports your learning, when it supports your growth. The superintendent of Jackson, Mississippi and I made it a point to have a monthly meeting. We'd get together for dinner once a month, and he would always talk about social-emotional learning and how we have to focus our academic environments not just on what's happening in the classroom, but it has to really involve what happens around the classroom. And that's really what the community is.

And so it's really thinking about how we bring together learning environments that are fully supportive of children and fully supportive of families, irrespective of their zip code, irrespective of where they live, irrespective of who your parents are. It really means that every child deserves these opportunities.

Lukas: Yeah, I love that as an overarching theme phrase right there: "Creating environments of opportunity for all."

I've had a very sledgehammer experience recently where I went to do a consult for an early childhood education center in a lower socioeconomic area. And as I walk through, I said, "This environment would not be acceptable in the suburb where I was this morning. It'd be shut down. They'd be like, no, you can't do this." Meanwhile, the governing department were more concerned about a child climbing the fence to get out of this lower socioeconomic concrete, astroturf jungle than they were about what the actual children were doing.

And it's just such a summary and such an example of what we're facing, not just in individual centers but we're seeing this time and time again over cities. And that's what I love about what you're doing in your collaboration. You're not just acting on the individual city. You guys are acting on the whole city and overcoming that.

And what pops to mind is you're creating this ecological web of care, compassion, consistency, where everything can grow by itself, but they're a part of this bigger living organism that's in everyone's best interest to thrive. You don't have to just copy someone. Grow in your way. But like, as easy as a Google doc can do that, everyone can share.

So what most excites you that's happening in this collaboration at the moment?

Robert: I think what really excites me is the opportunities that lay in front of us. We have a fairly solid infrastructure underneath of us, and we have teams that are really fully integrated. When I started this position, one of the first meetings that I had was with Sarah's team and my team. And as a newcomer, it was hard for me to differentiate who was working for who, which was really exciting because it's just this wonderful collaboration.

And it's bringing resources to cities that were not there before, but doing it in a way that is so supportive and caring and wholesome, essentially, for communities. And so I think that there are very bright futures in the work that we're doing together. And I'm just so excited about having her partnership and the partnership of the Children & Nature Network and really thinking about how we are being intentional about this work.

Sarah: A hundred percent. I appreciate that, Robert. And it is true about our teams. I've been a part of a lot of nonprofit partnerships, and I've never been a part of one that's quite like this. Truly, we each bring different strengths to the partnership. And so the team actually functions as a whole — kind of a Venn diagram between our two organizations.

For me, what's most exciting — I think over the last seven years, as Robert was pointing out, we've really established a baseline and a solid foundation for this work. And where I see us heading now is really towards being able to point to models that work, that can be replicated, that can start to show these strategies being implemented at scale, and where we can see that return on investment for private dollars going in to really establish strong processes. And then bringing along government and other private dollars to really support long-term implementation and sustainability.

So I just think it's an exciting time. I think the fact — I mean, COVID taught us a lot of things, but one thing it did teach us is that we're capable of changing very quickly. And I think that there's still an openness right now to trying new things. And so I'm just excited that this partnership is in place and has been working and is ready to take, you know, to really leverage this moment.

Lukas: Yeah. And so it's exciting. And we need to supply an environment of opportunity, but it seems like you and your collaboration is thriving in this bigger environment of opportunity at the same time.

And what pops to mind is trains — as in, like, play as important as trains. It's like not one or the other. They're equally important and held in the same esteem. So I think that's what you're doing so well.

And it's been so great to chat to you today. And I've got to thank you. Going to the Children & Nature Network conference in the States when we could fly was a real eye-opener to creating a really supportive culture and collaboration. And it's gone from all the way down. It's evident in your collaboration, but it's also evident within conversations I've had with participants of conferences and things. And going all the way from grassroots, top to bottom, side to side.

And thank you for creating and giving opportunity to so many children.

Sarah: Well, join us in May of 2022 in Atlanta, Lukas. We're having our next international conference. We're so excited to gather people in person again. So yeah.

Lukas: I was booked to go to Atlanta for the last one, but things happen. But I'll definitely be there again. And I'll look forward to it. So thank you so much once again. Thanks for joining us on the Play It Forward Wearthy Podcast.

Sarah: Thanks for having us.